Fra legmets pleje til viljens styrke. - Læremiddel.dk

meanings, concepts, images, and ideas which enable us to interpret the world. However, this does
not mean that culture does not concern feelings, action, and practices. Based on the theories of late
Ludwig Wittgenstein and Michel Foucault the thesis puts forward two major statements concerning
the relation between language and culture, also outlining health culture as an analytical category.
First it states that we give things meaning by how we represent them, the words we
use about them, the images of them we produce etc. Thus, the thesis puts language use at the centre
of the investigation emphasizing that language is profoundly a social thing. People establish
communities and take part in a social world by taking part in what Wittgenstein terms „language
games‟. Thus language and culture are closely interconnected and culture has to do with shared
meanings.
Secondly it puts forward the claim that culture is about historically specific
possibilities for representation. Inspired by Foucault the thesis looks at patterns in a number of
statements pointing to culture as presupposition.
The methodological approach is based on Foucault‟s historical and comparative
method, Max Weber‟s theory of ideal types and ethnological cultural analysis. The thesis develops
ten heuristic parameters applicable in analyzing health cultures. The parameters are developed in a
dialectic process with the empirical material. Their intention is primarily to present the analytical
focus with reference to comparisons, discussions of differences and similarities in priorities
between the cultures. But they also function as part of the result and as suggestion for heuristic tools
for further analysis of health cultures.
Results and perspectives
Looking at a variety of pedagogic texts, especially paying attention to about 45 teaching resources,
the study depicts four different ideal types of health culture in the Danish Primary School since
1975.
Health as a hygienic culture is the first health culture. It reflects to a great extent the
perspective on health in the 100 years prior to 1975. It refers to a culture primarily concerned with
knowledge about and maintenance of the body, especially in a medical sense. This culture considers
the human being as a biological system and the clinically defined, anatomically correct body is the
foundation for health. Thus man is created in absolute health and with the right regular way of
living it is possible to remain healthy. Of great importance is cleanliness directed both towards the
body and towards the surroundings. Thereby each body part can maintain its function. The
235